We examine the strategic use of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) in imperfectly competitive markets. The level of CSR determines the weight a firm puts on consumer surplus in its objective function before it decides upon supply. First, we consider symmetric Cournot competition and show that...

We theoretically analyse the relationship between Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and tax avoidance of an oligopolistic firm. The firm maximises a weighted sum of profits and a CSR objective which depends on output and the firm's contribution to public good provision, i.e. tax payments....

We examine the role of CSR as a mechanism for private provision of public goods. We argue that corporations are using CSR to signal high product quality and demonstrate that signaling gives rise to an excessive level of contributions that offsets the positive externality, which causes the...

Is green consumerism beneficial to the environment and the economy? To shed light on this question, we study the political economy of environmental regulations in a model with neutral and green consumers where the latter derive some warm glow from buying a good of higher environmental quality...

Digital media goods and digital media platforms exhibit cost structures and network effects that imply that price and quantity effects of consumption taxes are qualitatively different compared to what we typically find for physical goods. For instance, in most European countries and US states,...

This paper investigates the impact of restrictive TBTs on firms' extensive margins (export participation and exit probability), intensive margins (export value) and pricing strategy (export price). To this end, product-level restrictive TBTs and firm-level export are combined and an...

We compare the strategic potential of Corporate Social Responsibility and Customer Orientation as commitments to larger quantities in Cournot competition. In addition to profits, firms can choose to care for the surplus of either all consumers (CSR) or their own customers only (CO), and if so,...

We investigate whether growth in consumer income causes an increased willingness to pay to mitigate negative externalities from consumption. Correlational field evidence suggests a positive relationship between income and social responsibility. To investigate a causal link, we conduct a...

We investigate the effect of a ban on third-degree price discrimination on the sustainability of collusion. We build a model with two firms that may be able to discriminate between two consumer groups. Two cases are analyzed: (i) Best-response symmetries so that profits in the static Nash...

This paper shows that price rigidity evolves in an economy populated by imperfectly rational agents who experiment with alternative rules of thumb. In the model, firms must set their prices in face of aggregate demand shocks. Their payoff depends on the level of aggregate demand, as well as on...